This great Hindu teacher occasionally came to California to
give lectures at Ojai. My mother and father went once, asked
me if I wanted to go. I turned them down. stayed in the pool at
the hotel, watching stuff go on I was too young to watch.
When I read
what the master said, I'm sorry I refused.
Hey, I was 13. But I could still kick my butt.

Keep Far Away
by Jiddhu Krishnamurti

You should never beheretoo much; be so far away that
they canít find you, they canít get AT YOU to shape,
to mold.

Be so far away, like the mountains, like the
unpolluted air; be so far away that you have no
parents, no relations, no family, no country; be so
far away that you donít know even where you are.

Donít let them find you; donít come into contact with them
too closely. Keep far away where even you canít find
yourself; keep a distance which can never be crossed
over; keep a passage open always through which no one
can come. Donít shut the door for there is no door,
only an open, endless passage; if you shut any door,
they will be very close to you, then you are lost.

Keep far away where their breath canít reach you and
their breath travels very far and very deeply; donít
get contaminated by them, by their word, by their
gesture, by their great knowledge; they have great
knowledge but be far away from them where even you
cannot find yourself.

For they are waiting for you, at every corner,
in every house to shape you, to mold
you, to tear you to pieces and then put you together
in their own image.

Their gods, the little ones and the big ones,
are the images of themselves, carved by
their own mind or by their own hands. They are waiting
for you, both the churchman and the Communist, the believer
and the non-believer, for they are both the same; they
think they are different but they are not for they
both brainwash you, till you are of them, till you
repeat their words, till you worship their saints, the
ancient and the recent; they have armies for their
gods and for their countries and they are experts in
killing.

Keep far away but they are waiting for you,
the educator and the businessman; one trains you for
the others to conform to the demands of their society,
which is a deadly thing.

They have a thing called society and family:
these two are their real gods, the
net in which you will be entangled.

They will make you into a scientist, into an engineer, into an expert
of almost anything from cooking to architecture to philosophy.
Keep far, far away; they are waiting for
you, the politician and the reformer; the one drags
you down into the gutter and then the other reforms
you; they juggle with words and you will be lost in
their wilderness. Keep far away; they are waiting for
you, the experts in god and the bomb throwers: the one
will convince you and the other [show you] how to
kill; there are so many ways to find god and so many,
many ways to kill.

But besides all these, there are hoards of others
to tell you what to do and what not
to do; keep away from all of them, so far away that
you cannot find yourself or any other. You too would
like to play with all of them who are waiting for you
but then the play becomes so complicated and
entertaining that you will be lost.

You should never be here too much, be so far
away that even you cannot find yourself.